


What Greater Gift

by BlackBlood1872



Series: Sugar, we're going down [1]
Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff, Gen, i'm tagging the cat bc i love her, learning to love your house tiger, post episode 75 pre episode 80, sammy gets a cat, wherein Sammy and Ben are roommates but Lily isn’t living there yet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-12 13:42:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19133194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackBlood1872/pseuds/BlackBlood1872
Summary: Like any good pair of friends and roommates, Sammy and Ben argued about plenty of things. Most recently, they’ve been arguing about cats. ("House tigers, Sammy." "I amnotcalling them that.")Ben thought they should get one. Sammy didnot.(Unfortunately for Sammy, he didn’t usually win these arguments.)





	What Greater Gift

**Author's Note:**

> _"What greater gift than the love of a cat?" – Charles Dickens_
> 
>  
> 
> I wrote all of this on June 6th (from about 5pm to 11pm) with some minor editing today. I just... I really love cats, okay? And I've been feeling pretty happy since I got my hair cut, and this just created itself, really. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy it!

They get a cat.

It wasn't a decision Sammy was a part of. Ben had been talking about it, threatening Sammy with it—though of course he'd used that ridiculous name like he always did. But that was all Sammy thought it was: an idle threat. A joke.

Apparently Sammy had been mistaken.

He woke late in the day, as expected when one works in the middle of the night. It was some time in the afternoon, but Sammy didn’t care to check a clock for an exact number. It didn’t really matter.

What mattered to him was the large scratching post “cat tree” now standing next to the living room window, and the ball of fur currently sleeping on it. Sammy stopped in the doorway and just stared.

Ben, sitting on the couch and also staring at the cat, must have spotted him out of the corner of his eye. He turned with a megawatt grin stretched across his face, eyes lit with joy. “Sammy! Good morning!”

“Afternoon,” Sammy murmured back, half greeting, half correction. He didn’t take his eyes off the cat. “What is this?” he asked mildly.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Ben at least had the decency to grimace. “Uh. I… found a house tiger?”

“A cat,” Sammy said, and this time it was a correction, though the blatant disbelief in his voice meant it was also an accusation. “You got a _cat_.”

“Yes,” Ben said firmly, with a nod and a fiercely protective set to his jaw. “She was dropped off in a box outside and now she’s ours.”

“Really,” Sammy deadpanned. He… wasn’t really mad. How could he be when the cat was tiny and cute and rescued from a life on the streets? He couldn’t be mad about that.

But he could be a jerk about it for a while. Just to get Ben back for not consulting him about this.

* * *

“That’s not our cat,” Sammy said the next time he passed through the room. Ben looked up from where he was dangling a string in front of the cat (named Sugar) and pouted at him. Sugar took his distraction as her chance to jump at the fingers holding the toy, and Ben yelped as tiny needles dug into his hand.

Sammy failed to muffle a laugh as he retreated to the kitchen to make breakfast.

Each time he entered a room to find Ben interacting with Sugar, he said that phrase. “That’s not our cat.” It became routine soon enough, and he said it more and more absently as time went on. And, well, he got used to saying it, but his actions did nothing but contradict him. He'd been good on it for that first week—Sugar wasn’t allowed in his room, and he resisted the urge to pet her whenever he saw her around. It helped that Ben was with her almost 24/7 during the first month.

But time passed and Sugar became a normal part of the household. They noticed her favorite spots to sleep, and they knew her favorite toys, and they figured out which food she preferred. She’d snuck into Sammy’s room the one time he forgot to close his door, and after seeing her so happily kneading his pillows, he couldn’t force her out again. She slowly but steadily broke through his barriers. She started to fit in.

She became their cat.

Ben also got more lenient, and didn’t spend quite as much time exclusively with the cat. He started to go out on dates with Emily. After a very long and unnecessary conversation with Sammy, he started to spend some nights over at hers.

Leaving Sammy alone in the apartment with Sugar.

That evening, he sat down on the couch with his supper, and ate to the background noise of some random podcast Ben was trying to get him interested in. Something about urban legends. Sammy really wasn’t paying attention, but it was nice to have something playing. It made him feel less alone.

He didn’t hear the near-silent tread of little paws, and only noticed Sugar when she jumped onto the couch next to him with a little noise that he never knew cats could make. A tiny trill that he couldn’t figure out how to translate into English. Something that was mostly R's. It was… cute.

Sugar rubbed against his leg, purring loudly and unsteadily, a broken crackling rumble that brought an unconscious smile to his lips. She turned around in a circle before falling down, more heavily than her size should have allowed, curling into a hot little ball at his hip.

Sammy's heart melted.

He couldn’t stop himself from vocalizing a little “aw,” looking down at this tiny creature that trusted him enough to fall asleep next to him. He set down his dish, thankfully finished by now, and once his hands were free, rested the closest one gently on the cat.

His hand covered her almost entirely. She was so small. Something he could so easily hurt by accident, if he wasn’t careful. Even so, she purred louder, stretching to press against his hand. Trusting him completely.

Sammy wasn’t going to cry, he told himself as the emotions welling up inside him caused him to tear up. It was just a cat.

Except it wasn’t _just a cat_. She was their cat. A tiny creature that relied on them, on him, to live, and trusted and _loved_ him enough to do so. A living being who loved him completely and wanted to be around him. Ben was that too, but this… Sugar was different. Somehow. He wasn’t entirely sure how, yet, but she was and he was so, _so_ happy to have her in his life.

Sammy ran his hand down her back and her purr skipped, restarting into something louder but no less enthusiastic than ever. Sammy lost himself in the sound, in the gentle brush of her fur, in her warmth. At some point, she crawled into his lap, tiny needle claws kneading his thigh. He half-heartedly tugged at her paws, trying to teach her _no, don’t do that_ , but honestly? He wasn’t in the mood to chastise her for anything. He could put up with a little pain if she was happy. Sugar settled down again soon enough, curling up and tucking her head under his hand. He scritched behind her ears, and she flicked one at him, and he couldn’t help but smile.

Sammy never realized just how happy he could be, sitting on the couch doing nothing but petting a cat. But he was happy. Warm and content, and wanting nothing more than to stay here for the rest of the night. It wasn’t like he could move, anyway. As Ben would say, he was becatted. It was illegal to move.

So he didn’t. Sammy stayed on the couch, gently petting their cat, until his eyes started to droop and he thought, “ _I’ll just take a short nap_.”

* * *

Sammy didn’t know how long he slept. He hadn’t been a heavy sleeper recently, though, so when the door opened, he found himself drifting back to wakefulness. Not very quickly, and that was probably the only reason Ben was able to sneak up on him. Sammy heard a giggle, a little “aw” which was by now an expected reaction to Sugar doing literally anything, and then the quiet sound of a camera shutter.

Sammy blinked. His head lolled on the back of the couch, and he squinted at Ben. His friend was standing beside the couch, his phone held up on front of his face, and there was the shutter again.

He was taking pictures. Sammy blinked again. Very slowly, he realized what that meant.

“No,” he whined. Ben laughed at him.

“I knew you liked her!” he declared, thankfully keeping his voice down. Sugar grumbled a little in her sleep, shifting for a moment before settling again. Sammy shot him a sleepy glower.

“I don’t,” he protested, but it lacked conviction. Rightfully so, since he’d started petting Sugar again and she was already purring, and warmth was pooling in his chest. Ben shot him a _look_ , eyebrows raised high up into his hairline.

“Uh _-huh_ ,” he said. “Well, I’ve got photographic evidence to the contrary, buddy. Sorry, but that’s never going to work again. Just admit it! You love her.”

Sammy scowled at him, but with a purring ball of soft fur in his lap, he couldn’t keep that up for longer than a few seconds. He sighed, long and deeply put-upon, and let his head drop back onto the back of the couch. “Okay, _fine_. I love her. You happy now?”

“Yes, immensely,” Ben confirmed immediately. He walked around to the other side of the couch and plopped down, legs pulled up under him and leaning over so he could pet the cat too. Sugar chirped in surprise, then leaned into the new touch readily. Sammy watched with a smile tugging at his lips.

He never could have imagined he'd end up here, with a best friend who loved him too much to give up and a _cat_ who didn’t care if he was depressed as long as he gave her attention, and a family during a time when he thought he had nothing left. It was… so much more than he ever thought he would have.

“…thank you,” Sammy said quietly, more towards Sugar than Ben. But it was for him. For his meddlesome, annoying, incredibly caring best friend.

“What for?” Ben asked. He kept his voice low, so not to wake Sugar earlier than they had to. And also because he didn’t think he could speak louder in the softness of this moment.

“Just… for everything, I guess. Putting up with me. Letting me stay here. Getting us a cat. I appreciate it. So… thanks, Ben. You’re the best friend I could have asked for.”

Ben sniffled, and didn’t even try to blame it on allergies. “Sammy? I’m so glad I met you, you know? I love you, and all of this? I couldn’t do anything less.”

Sammy reached over and pulled Ben into a hug. Ben threw both his arms around Sammy and hugged back tight enough to make him squeak. Sugar, now squished between them, gave an unhappy squawk and squeezed out of the embrace, darting away to hide in another room. Sammy rested his cheek on Ben’s head and chuckled fondly.

“Now, _she’s_ got the right idea,” Sammy joked. “Gotta run away from all this affection.”

“You can never have too much love,” Ben argued, voice muffled from where his face was hidden in Sammy’s shirt. “She has no idea what she’s missing out on here.”

“No,” Sammy agreed quietly, “she doesn’t.”


End file.
